Dr. Robert Needlman
Specialist in pediatric behavior and development.
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 Ask Dr. Needlman
Seven-Year-Old Secretly Wearing Baby Brother's Diapers | | | QUESTION | | | Dear Dr. Needlman,
I have a seven-year-old and a four-month-old. Recently my seven-year-old has been keeping a secret, he has been going behind my back and getting into my infant's diapers. It has gone as far as my seven-year-old trying the diapers on and peeing in them and then to top it all off he is going to school with them on and telling the kids. He is not showing any signs of being jealous towards the baby; in fact, you can see how much he loves his brother. He says he does not know why he puts them on or hides them--he just does...What could be the reason and is it something my husband and I should worry about. What can we do?— Detria in APO, AE | | | ANSWER |
November 29, 2001 | | | Dear Detria,
I think that a lot of older children hold on to fantasies about what it was like to be a baby. Sometimes they play at talking baby talk, want to carry around a bottle, or crawl around, pretending they don't know how to walk. Having a new baby at home often makes this sort of fantasy more intense. Behind this playing is a normal wish that everybody has at one time or another to be taken care of and loved like a baby is, and not to have to do the hard things a big kid (or a grown-up) is required to do, such as going to school or work. Using a diaper is another powerful symbol of babyhood, and perhaps your son's diaper play is really an expression of this universal--and completely normal--tension between wanting to be grown-up and a "big boy" and wanting to be a baby again. Wearing the diaper to school might be a way to try to get some attention. I doubt, however, that it's getting your son the kind of attention that he really wants.
It's also possible that urinating in the diapers is a way that your seven-year-old has found to express some of the other mixed feelings older siblings very often have toward the new baby. It's rare (maybe nonexistent!) for an older brother to only feel love toward the new baby who is taking up most of his mother's time and energy, not to mention getting a lot of attention from everyone else, too. This isn't to say that your eldest doesn't really love his brother. He surely does, but he also probably feels some anger mixed in with the love, and he may not feel comfortable admitting that (after all, big brothers know that they're supposed to love the new baby). Secretly peeing on the baby's diapers might be a way to express negative feelings in a way that seems somehow safer.
Of course, I can't know if any of these possibilities really explain what is going on with your son, because I haven't met him or talked with him. I'm only suggesting that these are some perfectly normal, understandable reasons why a child might do what your son is doing. You asked if you should be worried, and I think that the diaper caper alone is not something that would concern me too much.
Think about other aspects of your son's life. Is he eating, sleeping, and playing normally? Is he reasonably well behaved at home and in school? Does he have friends or playmates? Does he seem happy and secure most of the time? Is he developing his physical and mental skills like other children his age? If all of the answers to these questions are yes, then it's a good bet that the diaper business is not a sign of any deep upset. Let your son know that he's welcome to play with the baby's diapers (within reason), and even take them to school. See if he's interested in helping with the diaper changing some of the time.
Find some activities that only "big kids" can do with their parents and help him to celebrate his bigness. Let him know that it's ok for him to have mixed feelings about the baby. Perhaps make up a story about a really good boy who loved his baby brother, but also wished he would just go away sometimes and not come back. In the end, the brothers might decide to be friends, even though they still sometimes get mad at each other.
Expect that your son's diaper interest will fade out. If it seems to be lasting too long (more than a few weeks), then you might want to talk with your son's pediatrician or family doctor, who may help you to arrange consultation with a counselor or child mental health specialist who can help you figure out if there is something else bothering your son.— by Robert Needlman, M.D., F.A.A.P. |
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